What causes certain aspects of a dream?

Question

I've come to realize that if I think about something a lot, I will not dream about it. For example, when Steve Irwin died I thought about him literally from the time I woke up until the time I fell asleep, and I never had a dream about him whatsoever. But instead, I will dream about a few things I had seen that day and not really taken into consideration, such as a truck passing, a dog walking by, a commercial on a television, and a friend. I will end up having a dream about driving in a truck with a friend, going to the place on the commercial, and hitting a dog or something along those lines. That's just an example of course, but what causes this? Is there any way to control what I dream about before I start dreaming? I can control my dreams after I've started dreaming them, but is there any way to control what goes into my dreams?

Answer 1

We choose what we wish to remember, mostly. Plus we recall only a fraction of what is going on within us at night. What we do recall is governed by what is important to us at the moment, and will override lesser content. A jumble of recent recalls is simply a means of off-loading unnecessary detail to clear our heads for the following day.

Over-learning a subject is a proven technique to manage the dream state as a re-enforcement to daytime studies. Languages, dense subjects such as law or medicine benefit this way, so surround yourself in a form of research- it aught to work.